When dealing with multi-material structures and their testing, questions arise with regard to possible aging mechanisms of the materials used in service, which have to be answered as fully as possible during the design phase in order to ensure the correct design of the subsequent component. According to the current state of the art, there is a limited possibility for the evaluation of the suitability of filled and unfilled potting materials in the design phase of multi-material structures, whereby corresponding data cannot be generated. The aim of this work is the simple and cost-effective mapping of aging effects in combination with high mechanical loads in a test geometry for the evaluation of potting materials and the material combinations produced with them.
For this purpose, a cylindrical test specimen was developed in which a specially shaped metal insert is encased with the potting material to be tested. The mechanical stress levels can be adjusted by using different metal and geometry combinations for the insert, taking advantage of the delta-alpha difference. Temperature changes have proven to be advantageous for stressing the test specimen, which can also be combined with media aging. The amount of aging of the material combination as well as of the potting material is characterized in particular in the form of delamination phenomena as well as crack initiation and propagation on the test specimen. In addition, further relevant properties can be determined by adequate measuring methods, thus increasing the information content of the test specimen. This provides an opportunity to compare and evaluate different material composites and their properties on the basis of a relatively simple test geometry. Due to its low costs, it is possible to use statistical test approaches in a practice-oriented manner, whereby a high significance and informative value of the evaluation is achieved.